Triads and inversions
What exactly are “chords” again?
A triad is a chord. A chord always consists of at least 3 tones. Inversions are nothing more than rearranging the order of tones within a chord.
We’ve already discussed the different ways to play a chord.
It’s best to start from the C Ionian. We can all sing this scale since we know it from songs like ‘All My Little Ducklings’.
For a C major chord, we need the first (also called the root), the third (third), and the fifth (fifth) tone from the C Ionian. When we play these notes together, the C major chord sounds.
So we would have 1–3–5 = C — E — G.
How do I play inversions of these?
The root position is as described above: 1–3–5 in this order.
The first inversion would be: 3–5–1 and the second inversion: 5–1–3.
Inversions are not only visible but also audible.
In the root position, we hear two thirds stacked on top of each other.
In the first inversion, we hear a minor third followed by a perfect fourth:
The final inversion is easily recognizable by its perfect fourth followed by a major third:
On all String Sets
Of course, these inversions can be applied not only on a specific set of strings but on all possible combinations consisting of 3 strings.
Let’s start with the standard string groups.
The guitar has 6 strings, typically. E — A — D — G — B — e.
So there are 4 possibilities to play triads.
1: E — A — D strings
2: A — D — G strings
3: D — G — B strings
4: G — B — e strings
Below is the listing of the aforementioned string groups.
Another way to play triads is by adding larger intervals. In this example, we always omit one string and group the strings differently:
1: E — D — B strings
2: A — G — E strings
Or also:
3: E — G — B strings
4: A — B — E strings
These examples are just ideas and are not directly related to this topic or are an addition to this topic. We briefly looked at these Drop2 chords or Drop3 chords before.
